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OU Servers Open To Hackers For A Year
SecurityProNews
Staff Writer
2006-05-22
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Administrators at Ohio University were surprised to find out from the FBI that not only were three servers containing very sensitive personal information hacked, but that they'd been wide open for over a year. School officials called it a failure of polices and procedures.
At least one technician has been put on paid leave because of the intrusion, says Cnet, as OU scrambles to reorganize its computer services department. The year-long hacking of university servers is a low estimate, and could have been going on longer.
A notice on the university website informed visitors that the school was working with the FBI and "top forensic consultants" and other colleges and universities that had experienced similar breaches. The website lists these three incidents:
On Friday, April 21, the FBI advised the Technology Transfer Department at Ohio University's Innovation Center that a server containing office files had been compromised. Data on the server included e-mails, patent and intellectual property files, and 35 Social Security numbers associated with parking passes
On Wednesday, April 24, the IT Security Team discovered a server that supports alumni relations and development was being used in a denial of service attack on a computer system outside of the university. The system contained the Social Security numbers of 137,000 individuals
On Thursday, May 4, the IT Security Team discovered that a computer system affiliated with Hudson Health Center had been compromised. The compromised system contained personal information on approximately 60,000 current and former students as well as some faculty and staff at Ohio University. This includes all current Athens Campus students, as well as individuals registered as a student on the Athens Campus at any time since fall 2001.
In one of the incidents, a university spokesman said, employees thought they'd shut down a server that was supposed to be online. But it was not shut down and stayed connected to the Internet without any subsequent security updates.
About the Author:
SecurityProNews is a daily online and email publication focusing on internet security issues.
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